HAIKAIS[1]
I
You laughed while I wept,
Yet my tears and your laughter
Had only one source.
II
Yes! I was startled,
For I saw there beside you
Love's apparition!
III
Our lips spoke no word,
Yet we talked long together,
Eye answering eye.
IV
The music fills me
With passionate yearnings—
Where art thou, loved one?
V
Passion of laughter
Convulsed me, but then followed
Passion of weeping.
VI
'Twas winter weather
When yon bloomed forth before me—
Then summer flourished!
VII
Beauty's in all things!
Mom is lovely, but also
Lovely the night is.
VIII
The snow fell and robed
London's great guilty city
In purity's garb.
IX
I heard my love sing:
She knew not that I heard her,
Nor saw how I trembled.
X
Sunshine or tempest,
Desperation or triumph,
Come at her summons!
XI
O my beloved one!
My tears flow when I think that
Mortal our love is!
XII
Ah! what a fragment,
Though to fourscore extended,
The life of a man is!
1899
- ↑ "A Haikai is a Japanese form of verse, consisting of three unrhymed lines of five, seven, and five syllables respectively, or seventeen syllables in all. Hitherto they have not, we believe, been written in English."—The Academy, April 8, 1899.